Improvement in medical vacuum-chambers



A .by

GEORGE HADFIELD, OF CINCINNATI, OHIO.

IMPROVEMENT IN MEDICAL VACUUM-CHAMBERS.

Specification forming part of Letters Patent No. 59,388, dated November 6, 1866.

To all 'whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, GEORGE HADFIELD, of Cincinnati, Hamilton county, Ohio, have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Medical Vacuum-Chambers, and I do hereby declare the following to be afull, clear, and exact description thereof, reference being had to the accompanying drawings, making part of this specication.

My improvements relates to the class of devices known as medical vacuum-chambers, or dry-cupping apparatus, for temporarily removing the atmospheric pressure from any desired part or member ot' the human body, and my present invention is more particularly -directed to apparatus adapted for use upon an arm or a leg.

Figures l and 2 are longitudinal sections of vacuum-chambers intended for application to an arm and a leg, respectively. Fig. 3 represents a chamber adapted for use on a stift' leg.

A is the chamber proper, being a deep box or trunk, composed of tin or other rigid and air-tight material. B is a coupling for attachment ot a hose connected with an air-pump or other means of creating a vacuum, or partial vacuum, in the chamber. C is a faucet, accessible both to the patient and to the operator, to enable a partial restoration of the natural pressure whenever the rarefaction has become too painful to the patient.

The apparatus is made self-sealing by mea-ns of an india-rubber lip, D, around the entrance or margin of the chamber, which lip, the instant that the air is rareiied by the operator, closes automatically around the limb ofthe patient and excludes the external air.

In order to prevent injury to a paralyzed hand by being drawn or forced in a constrained or cramped condition against the end of the vacuum-chamber, I provide a cross-bar or rest, E, around which the thumb and iingers of the paralytic can be arranged by the operator; and for the same object I provide a self-sealing screw or cap, F, which, being unscrewed, affords access for the hand of' the operator to adjust the lingers of the patient.

When the limb, Whether arm or leg, is permanently crooked, the vacuum-chamber may be made in the angular form represented in Fig. 3.

I claim herein as new and of my invention- The rest E and self-sealing cap F, for the purposes set forth. y

In testimony of which invention I hereunto set my hand.`

GEORGE EADEIELD, M. D.

Witnesses GEO. H. KNIGHT, JAMES H. LAYMAN. 

